Delta refuses boarding to Poop Strong man for flying while brown and wearing the security theater shirt I designed

Back in 2007, I designed a shirt for Woot! that featured a screaming eagle clutching an unlaced shoe and a crushed water bottle, surrounded by the motto MOISTURE BOMBS ZOMG TERRORISTS ZOMG GONNA KILL US ALL ZOMG ZOMG ALERT LEVEL BLOODRED RUN RUN TAKE OFF YOUR SHOES. Among the lucky owners of this garment is Arijit "Poop Strong" Guha, who proudly wore it this week as he headed for a Delta flight from Buffalo-Niagara International Airport to his home in Phoenix.

But it was not to be. First, the TSADelta agents questioned him closely about the shirt, and made him agree to change it, submit to a secondary screening and board last. He complied with these rules, but then he was pulled aside by multiple Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority cops, more TSA, and a Delta official and searched again. No one found anything untoward, but --

The Delta official told Arijit he wouldn't be allowed to board, and neither would his wife. Period.

When Arijit complained about this, the Niagara Transport cops got "aggressive," questioning him further and noting in their discussions that "he looks foreign." Now Arijit understood that the problem was Flying While Brown. The Niagara Transport cops had lots of dumb questions, like why Arijit's wife hadn't taken his last name, why he had opted out of the pornoscanner, and then they sicced the drug-seeking dogs on him.

Delta rebooked them for a flight the next day, but didn't offer Arijit and his wife a hotel room overnight -- and when they turned up at the airport, they discovered that their "confirmed" seats weren't confirmed, and unless eight passengers on the oversold flight agreed to fly later, they wouldn't be getting on that plane, either.

It turns out that Delta has a pattern of removing brown people from its airplanes when its pilots and passengers evince thinly veiled (or obvious) racist fears, too.

Having been booted from our flight, the transit police now began to aggressively question us. At one point, I was asked where my brother lives (he was the one who gifted me the shirt). A bit surprised by the irrelevant question, I paused for a moment before answering.

“You had to think about that one. How come?,” she asked. I explained he recently moved. “Where'd he move from?” “Michigan,” I respond. “Michigan, what's that?,” she says. At this point, the main TSA agent who'd questioned me earlier interjected: “He said ‘Michigan’.” Unable to withhold my snark, I responded with an eye-rolling sneer: “You've never heard of Michigan?”

This response did not please her partner, a transit cop named Mark. Mark grabbed his walkie-talkie and alerted his supervisor and proceeded to request that he be granted permission to question me further in a private room. His justification?: “First he hesitated, then he gave a stupid answer.” Michigan, my friends, is a stupid answer.

And then, he decided to drop any façade of fair treatment: the veil was lifted, this was about who I was and how I looked: “And he looks foreign.”

Well, Buffalo is pretty close to Canada, so maybe he thought I looked Canadian. What does a Canadian look like anyway? Whatever it is, I’m sure that’s precisely what he was thinking. Certainly he wasn’t implying that dark-skinned people are not real Americans and that white people are the only true Americans. (I wonder what those who settled this land well before the arrival of Europeans would have to say about that.)

198 Responses to “Delta refuses boarding to Poop Strong man for flying while brown and wearing the security theater shirt I designed”

These kind of situations always reminds me of East Germany and the STASI, who seem to have been reborn in the U.S. only under various government agencies.
I do wonder however, why do Americans complain about other nations who are so abusive to its citizens, but are perfectly fine when their own government does it to them?

No, only a majority of those US citizens who voted for “them”. I think it was George Carlin who pointed out that a majority of US citizens votes for No One in essentially every presidential election. No One is usually the best candidate so I salute the wisdom of my fellow Americans.

Since I have zero control over US party politics and that’s where policy and candidates are decided (to the extent that it’s not just a charade in the first place) I don’t accept that the terrible candidates on offer let alone the ones who actually get elected are my responsibility.

I think my response is pretty fair considering how consistently USians actually do complain about the very serious problems in the USA.

Edit: Wait a second…are you suggesting we’d be in a better position if we had elected McCain/Palin? Because that WAS the other option.

You can’t just say you complain about it, but do nothing. That’s whining.
Not taking responsibility for your elected officials in a supposedly democratic system isn’t really helping. Like it or not, they represent YOU. Or at least claim they do.

I suspect you have just as little control over your own political system if not less and you’re just using this opportunity to talk shit to USians. It’s a great idea. It’s really helping my cynicism and hopelessness.

> Since I have zero control over US party politics and that’s
> where policy and candidates are decided

We just had a primary election in Minnesota, and the turnout was 9%. So I guess that leaves 91% of the voting public who will shake their heads at the options on the general election ballot, because they have confused ‘not showing up’ with ‘having zero control’.

@ relawson Don’t some states allow a none of the above option in some ballots? In the UK we have had a NOTA (none of the above) party which aimed to field candidates in all constituencies. (Then again there is the nun of the above option and the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence).
In the UK anybody over 18 can stand for parliament as long as they are sponsored by ten electors from the constituency they wish to serve and pay a £500 deposit to encourage only serious contenders. Hehe.

There is always the option of spoiling your ballot paper – which is generally understood as a vote for none-of-the-above (well, this is how it works in the UK at least). Actually turning up and entering a spoiled paper is much stronger than not showing, which is usually brushed off as general apathy.

As a side thought, I’d like to bet none of the various electronic voting systems out there have a spolit-my-vote option. That’s a serious omission.

I believe the problem is not the system but the two parties entrenched within.
The media outlets consistently marginalize any third party candidate. In fact, it’s so bad that if you don’t run as a republican or democrat you are labeled a third party rather than referring to the actual party name to which the candidate is a member.The upshot of the situation is that no one from an outside party has any chance of being elected to any office which participates in federal policy or lawmaking.Of those in the two parties, it’s become increasingly clear that no one of any worth will be supported by either party. They want people they can easily control. This leads me to suspect that all elected politicians at the federal level are people who have something in their past or present which the party can hold over their heads to ensure that the party line is towed and tight.

The electorate, not having a valid choice of candidates is aware (at least on some level) of the situation and has dropped out of participating in the corruption. Sure, there are those who would say not voting is the problem, but I ask you, why vote when both parties are running the same machine?

I think Mario Savio said it best when he shouted –
“There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part! You can’t even passively take part! And you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels…upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop! And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!”

bcsizemoe, xzzy said ”
The guys who work in the huge white building with the big dome on top of it”. The “man in the huge white building who had his own private airplane” is the President. He lives in the White House. The White House does not have a dome.

I actually read the original post and he has in this case good things to say about the TSA they apparently were polite professional and told him they had no issues. His abuse came from the airline and the local Transportation Police. Still this kind of stuff is a major reason why my family opted to rent a car and spend 6 days on the road (3 there and 3 back) to visit my parents this summer instead of just flying out.

If you continue to fly, despite the TSA being in place, you’re part of the problem. Just. Say. No.

There are plenty of ways to rationalize your “need” to fly, but they rarely boil-down to more than “but I really, REALLY want to” or “it would personally inconvenience me not to”. Well, things are already plenty inconvenient for the Mr. Guhas of this world, and your continued support of the system only helps to keep things bad. It’s easy to say “I wish things were different”. Instead, say “boycott, boycott, boycott”.

Edit: so many of you describe visiting distant family as a “need”. It just, really, simply isn’t. I understand why it’s important, and that’s why you make the choices you do, but no one’s twisting your arm. You all make your own decisions, and if that means giving your money and approval by means of your cooperation to this agency, it’s because you decided that the issues at hand just aren’t important enough to you for you to change your behavior in a meaningful way. Maybe that doesn’t make you a bad person, but it absolutely means you’re part of the ongoing problem.

Bus — cost more than flying and take three days instead of three hours. Train — cost WAY more than a plane and take a day or two instead of three hours. Buying a car…really? It’s not just the one-time cost of buying a car. I live in a city and it would cost a significant proportion of my rent just to park it let alone insure it, fuel it, and maintain it. I have no other use for a car other than driving to FL. Why don’t you throw out “ponies” and “airships” while you’re at it?

Christ, what an asshole.

Edit: I don’t consider my family an inconvenience. Hence the “kind words.” I wasn’t talking about how I would have to skip my trip to Maui.

Edit: Sorry, I really didn’t intend to imply that your family is an inconvenience. I meant that due to added time and expense, alternate forms of travel can be more inconvenient than flying. So, you can say “I can live with the TSA” and have it easy, or say “that’s just not acceptable” and have it a little harder.

He’s got a point why don’t you just ride a unicycle, or strap on some rollerblades and stop being so lazy. It’s not like taking buses would cost you a full day in travel time or anything. I mean we all get loads of vacation time right?

Bus and train aren’t realistic options for a lot of the places people need to go for work/family.

As an example: I live in the same province as my hometown. My hometown is 16 hours from my current city. If I fly, I could fly there for a long weekend and not miss a day of work. If I drive, I need to take time off work (and be travelling for 16 hours instead of 2 hours).

@NathanHornby:disqus It’s easy to say that when you’re living in the UK – shorter distances, better and often cheaper public transport options, longer holidays… for many people (such as myself), 30+ hours driving for a weekend break would be a deal breaker (especially with kids involved), so the ‘minor cost’ would be ‘not seeing family’.

@NathanHornby:disqus : A general boycott wouldn’t even be effective anyway. The TSA isn’t a private for-profit company that has to deal with any meaningful form of competition or concern itself with things like “customer satisfaction.”

The protest you’re describing is akin to saying “if you don’t like racial profiling by the highway patrol then just boycott the roads.”

@Antinous_Moderator:disqus I’ve actually looked into that for myself, but unfortunately they don’t allow kids onboard. I do know single people who have had good experiences though, so that could be an option for them. As far as I know, it does involve planning a few months ahead if you are interested.

You do realize that many plane-free travel options ceased to exist when the airline industry came on the scene, right? Booking a stowage-class ticket on a steamer to Paris isn’t as feasible an option as it was in the 1930s.

You might as well ask people to protest internet censorship by communicating via telegram.

Never seeing distant family members in person or wasting entire days of limited vacation time is a “very minor inconvenience”?

Boycotting doesn’t work if the cost is massively higher for the person boycotting than the boycotted. 1% of the population sacrificing a large proportion of their few vacation days just so the airlines will see a 1% drop of customers isn’t going to work in the long term (and you won’t convince more than 1% of the flying population to make the sacrifices you ask). I’m pretty sure the TSA has had a larger effect than that on tourism, and it hasn’t changed anything.

Those who really have to fly should get a really dark fake tan and wear that t-shirt.

If enough people play the Spartacus gambit, the airlines will be put in the dilemma of either educating their staff or enforcing a de-facto boycott on *themselves* by refusing large numbers of paying customers.

Take Amtrak. It’s awesome! I take Amtrak all the time from Baltimore to Florida. If you can spring for it, the sleeper cars are the most luxurious way to travel I’ve ever experienced – far better than first class on an airplane, because you get privacy. You can lock the door and it’s like a hotel room.

Maybe the state could partner with the private sector to build an inter-island boat. One big enough to transport cars. Like a ferry, but really big– not just a regular ferry, but maybe some kind of super ferry. Just an idea.

I don’t read it that way. He’s not talking about the victim, he’s talking about you. But not about me, actually – because I stopped flying after one experience shortly after 9/11, where I was not permitted to help a person in distress because I did not have a uniform. Fuck the airlines, let them die.

Edit: so many of you describe visiting distant family as a “need”. It just, really, simply isn’t.

How dare people put emotional attachment to family over your hope that enough economic pressure will build up to encourage reform of abuses at airports, huh? It’s sad they can be so selfish as not to care how things affect other people.

It is in no way feasible for an “ethical boycott” of the airline industry to have any impact whatsoever on whether or not there is the TSA. It’s a really nice thought that everyone would just say “I’m willing to make big sacrifices to try and effect change” but that simple isn’t going to happen. Business travelers aren’t going to quit their jobs in order to stay off planes, and people aren’t going to waste time and vacation days to drive thousands of miles which can be flown in hours.

It may be difficult to effect change through non-economic means, but the TSA came to being that way and will have to cease that way as well.

Stories like this–plus my own nightmare of overzealous “security” procedures (denied a pre-purchased ticket at the counter and no refund all because my credit card included my company’s name in addition to the name on my driver’s license) are why I’ve been on flight strike since 2007. I drive instead–and enjoy the trip a HELL of a lot more.

Arrive two hours before your flight? I’m already out of town and well underway when I used to be waiting with no shoes on. That 45-minute to an hour delay? Not for me, thanks. Now I’m THREE hours underway. You get the idea.Now hear this, TSA…some of us vote with our $$$. Not nearly enough of us, though.

Not to mention the US is gorgeous to drive through. Even the flat parts in the middle have some lovely scenery if you’re willing to get off the interstates. I just got done with a 5500 mile road trip and it was many times more enjoyable than any vacation I’ve taken that involved a plane.

For people on a time crunch, there are some diminishing returns. If you accept that dealing with the airport theater is going to suck away at least a day of your life once you factor in all the delays and weariness caused by flying, cars are really only equivalent up to a range of about 700 miles (about the best you can hope for in a day of driving before fatigue sets in).

Anything longer than that an a plane is faster.. but I still maintain it’s a lot less fun. America is beautiful.

I gotta say, the shirt is kind of the equivalent of joking “yeah, some guy gave me this suitcase to take with me” when they used to ask “has any unknown person or persons contacted you about carrying luggage for them blah blah.” It’s funny when you’re not in an airport.

I believe it is over 1 Trillion US spent on Homeland Security, PBS Frontline did a story on just how many non-descript HS buildings have been built. Was it money well spent? Pretty much the worst terrorist incidents such as the Shoebomber, the UNderwear bomber, and the Times Square bomber were caught by other passengers on the planes – and in the case of the Times Square -other vendors alerted the police.

Once I was given a lot of extra scrutiny and had to explain in great detail why my laptop had an EFF “Come Back With A Warrant,” sticker across the top. “What does this mean?” to which I said, “It means come back with a warrant.”

Second I had a hoodie on from the band The Cult. It said on the back: “Destroy L’America” That was a fun one to explain and a very extensive groping.

I had another experience where I opted for the groping and they not only made me wait 30 minutes, but they stood around talking about me and laughing as if I’m the idiot because I won’t go through their sexy undressing machine.

International flights can use around 1 ton of carbon for each passenger, and I imagine cross-country flights aren’t any different. I suppose if you’re travelling with the whole family or friends (say 4 people), driving cross-country would be less carbon intensive.

As a resonant aside, it should be noted that I have flown to three cities in Canada and one in Jamaica since obtaining my NSK passport. In all incidents I have offered my Canadian passport as identification, along with my provincial/driver’s identification as well as the NSK passport. The only weirdness experienced was enroute back to Calgary from Jamaica — the official looked at me like I was wearing a tinfoil hat. Other than that, no authoritarian freakouts, yet.

It’s funny you say that. I used to wear that very same shirt when I traveled — before I started wearing this one. Turns out I got far fewer “random” searches with that one. And so, it’s back to wearing that one.

Until they invoke state secrets to kill the story in court, and then arrest the journalist as a suspected terror suspect or leaking “classified” information and disappear them down a hole as a reminder to anyone else that wants to challenge the Government.

So the difference between us and a dictatorship seems to be we just don’t understand we are screwed yet.

Well, maybe the journalist’s work will be to expose those barriers. If TSA agents are required to sign an oath of secrecy, that’s still information we don’t currently have. The entire operation is opaque.

The man being brown is not the problem. Don’t know why it’s included in the story other than for gratuitous race-chat. The shirt’s messaging is obviously the issue. I mean, in case no one flies anymore because of the horror of TSA, the security screeners employed in this useless effort represent the most delightfully diverse racial cross-section one could ask for in this country.

Okay, I’ll bite. Of course, it isn’t a threat. I assume a screener seeing the words “terrorist”, “bomb”, “kill” – just went whaaa? as the wearer was hoping they’d do in this tiny lounge act in the larger security theatre.

Going “Whaaa?” isn’t a problem. It’s going from “Whaaa?” to questioning based on the “Whaaa?” to “First he hesitated, then he gave a stupid answer,” to “And he looks foreign.”

Man, I hate the “Why did you hesitate?” question, have done ever since I was a teenager and a bus conductor decided I was claiming a child’s fare illicitly and started questioning me. How about, “I hesitated because it was a fucking stupid question, and you’re a jumped-up gauleiter with an inflated sense of self-worth and I don’t know why I’m fucking talking to you anyway?”

Let me turn that around. If a white man wore that shirt through airport security, do you think there would have been a problem? I’m going to say the answer is “NO”. Since the transit police specifically said “he looks foreign.”

I’ll assume this is really you, thanks for responding. By special screenings, if you mean like this last encounter with the t-shirt that ended with denial of service, I’d sue the airline and TSA. Clearly you’re a marked man with or w/o the t-shirt. If special screenings means wanded, groped, x-rayed, bag-sniffed – I’ve got at least 25. I despise it, too. Sorry I misspelled your name.

He has a right to wear what he wants but a shirt with the words “terrorist” and “kill” printed on it might not be the most pragmatic choice if a person wants to travel by plane without delay. He could have been slick about it and worn it under another shirt which he could have removed mid flight.

My question is “What in the hell does this shirt mean” and “who is stupid enough to design it?”

I think it is pretty stupid to try and board a plane with a shirt that says “Kill us all” or “Bombs”. Even before 911 I think this should be inappropriate., I don’t care what the color of your skin is.

Although an “intelligent” terrorist would probably not wear something like this, it does not mean that a disturbed person would not.

In all other free societies around the globe – you know, those USians like to belittle as inferior – people have rights and you don’t lose them because you behave inappropriate. Either you break laws or you don’t.

guy who wears attention grabbing shirt gets attention. Both the kind he hoped for, and the kind he expected, with just a little bit different kind of crossover between the two than he had planned. Let’s all continue to join him in acting like we’re accomplishing something here.

In the extraordinarily unlikely event that I wanted to visit my few living relatives, it would be a 2,988 mile car trip requiring 48 hours of driving time. If I drove eight hours per day, that would be twelve days of driving, round trip.

If this man wanted to fly from point A to point B he should have not worn the t-shirt. I am sorry to say the TSA and the airline employees have a lot of power and in today’s times you can not fight with them. What they did was wrong but unless you want to make a political statement you can not win with these guys.

Just wanted to say that Delta is the one airline I’ve vowed never to fly on again. When I went to D.C. for the March for Sanity, I was traveling with my friend. We’re both white, but he’s got a long ponytail, and we were only traveling for the weekend. So, of course we had to be a threat. (Neither of us were wearing graphic t-shirts in the airport. We wanted to get to D.C.)

First we pulled out of line and got wiped for possible explosives residue.

Then when we got to our flight, with only carry-ons, we got shifted to the end of the check-in. The plane was apparently not large enough to hold humans and their carry-ons, so they decided to try to take my luggage from me to check it. (Along with few other people’s.) I told them to shove it (politely) as I was carrying anti-convulsant medication in my one bag, and couldn’t risk it going missing for the weekend on the opposite side of the country. They nearly removed us from the plane because I didn’t want to be separated from medically-necessary prescription drugs or carry them in hand. At the last second, one of the Phoenix Airport general security people arrived and told Delta that they were being asshats.

David. I hope you understand what you are saying, but I am pretty sure you don’t.

If the guy was ASKING for trouble by wearing this shirt, it is only natural that anyone flagging a US passport or a US flag, be attacked by people around the world, because they are obviously a part of the global terrorism problem, initiated by the US.

America has turned into a fascist nazi state, and this is but one example of the NON freedoms it represents. No other nation on this planet has the same kind of exaggerated idiots as the US does employ in public “service”.

Boy, for the vice-chairman of the Liberty League, you sure are prone to being excessively deferential to questionably-defined authority.

Of course, you’re also the charmer who tweeted “When you support Pussy Riot, you are supporting the attack by militant and unrepentant atheists on the symbol of Christian victory in Russia”, so I think we’ve got your co-ordinates.

Yes, he was definitely taking a risk by wearing the shirt. And he couldn’t help being snarky with the stupid cops either. There is nothing right about the way they treated him and his wife, but if you are interested in arriving at your destination on time I suggest you leave the fucking shirt in the suitcase, m’kay? But if your goal is political theater, then by all means enjoy your cavity search!

Do you plan or recommend to anyone on wearing a t-shirt with the words “BOMBS” and “TERRORISTS” on it for your next flight? Please, if you do make sure they can see it when you go through security and let us know how that works out for you.

If I lived in the third world my parents would live in my mud hut with me and I’d need vacations away from them. But while we’re talking #firstworldproblems I would think the situation described in the OP would qualify nicely. Didn’t think to mention that?

Mine are dead, but I never visited them anyway. It’s all good; the value-gradient for family bonds within our species has a rather wide range. I should empathize with those who have a stronger empathic ‘bond’ with their parents. I was trying to make a joke, but yeah — I can can see how much it would suck to be ‘separated’ from those with whom I felt most ‘immanent’ with. But dang, if I had a mud hut, my parents wouldn’t know where it was located ;)

Yes she was definately taking a risk by wearing that skirt. And she couldn’t help being flirty with the bouncer either. There is nothing right about the way she was treated with her friend, but if you are interested in not being sexually assaulted in that part of town I suggest you leave the fucking skirt in the closet, Mkay, but if your goal is dressing attractively, then by all means enjoy your cavity check.

As much of a travesty as this is, it was hardly unexpected. If you have to be somewhere that requires you to interact with power tripping assholes, then if you want to actually get there you don’t antagonize them. Nobody likes it and we’re trying to get it changed, but don’t act shocked when said assholes make your life hell just because they can.

The worst part about his case is we can’t even complain about the TSA, because they weren’t the problem. It was the airline renta-cops that were responsible this time.

Excellent point Mitchell. We all just need to tow the line. The very idea that you should express yourself is clearly a terroristic threat to the good ol’ USA.
Those airline employees are our first line of defense against people who look ‘weird’

The same reason it’s no surprise that talking about “bombs” and “terrorists” on an airplane will get you in trouble is the same reason wearing a t-shirt with the words “bombs” and “terrorists” will get you in trouble going through an airport. It has nothing to do with wearing a t-shirt with an American Flag or whatever you’re trying to insinuate here.
He may have been discriminated against because of his race or nationality but wearing a t-shirt that no one with half a brain in their head would wear to an airport makes it hard to discern discrimination from prudency.
You shouldn’t expect the people who run security at airports to have a sense of humor.

I was with you until the nazi state bit and the clearly silly line “No other nation on this planet has the same kind of exaggerated idiots as the US does employ in public “service”.”
Really? The US has the market in governmental employee idiocy?

So, you are ok with people being harassed for wearing a T-Shirt that someone may not like?
Or, are you one of those people who think things are just this way and we all have to adjust our lives around petty fear and overblown egos?